The invention relates to a left-left flat knitting machine having two needle beds arranged in a common plane and knitting needles provided with needle hooks at both ends of the needles, which are activated by bars in needle bed channels of both needle beds.
In known left-left flat knitting machines, double head tongue needles, i.e. double hook needles each having a tongue, are provided as the knitting needles. The needles are activated by stitch transfer bars and knitting bars, the latter of which engage in the needle heads and push and pull the needles during operation of the two needle beds in the flat knitting machine.
With the aid of this type of double head tongue needle and the associated tools, customarily hand-knitted stitch loop fabrics can be produced automatically. Although there are a large number of such machines, not every operation of the needles can be achieved with this type of flat knitting machine. It is, for example, not possible for the needles to travel from one needle bed to the other and there form catch loops, because the stitches form the newly added thread into new stitches over the closing tongues.
Furthermore, the needle tongues must be controlled by special tools. The cooperation of these tools with the needle tongues must be so exact that the tools must be adapted to each other with extreme precision. Despite this, however, it does occur that needle bed combs and needle tongues are damaged. For this reason the needle bed combs are also formed as separate knock-over combs which are set into the needle bed. The manufacturing expense therefor is substantially greater than that of solid combs.